The Unseen (46 page)
Authors: JL Bryan
“
Witch’s intuition,” Cassidy said. “Or demonic intuition. I captured Nibhaz.” She lifted her shirt to show him the markings she’d carved.
“
Clever. We have to get him out of there before he poisons you.”
“
That’s why I brought you back.”
“
It wasn’t the pleasure of my company?” Ibis asked.
“
Maybe a little.”
Kieran let out a long, annoyed sigh and tapped his foot impatiently. He’d clearly seen too much to be shocked by the sight of a dead man brought to life in a bonfire.
“Can we
please
go already?” Kieran asked.
They returned to Cassidy’s mom’s apartment. The four of them spent a few hours talking over what had happened, particularly filling in Kieran and Barb on everything they didn’t know.
Cassidy and Barb weren’t in a hurry to return home and deal with Stray and the inevitable police investigation into the three dead bodies mangled by claws and fangs. Cassidy wondered what the cops would make of it. Now that the crazed events of the night had passed, she had time to really feel terrible for what had happened to Allie, and to Whitley and Chet, even if those guys had kind of been self-absorbed jerks. They certainly hadn’t deserved a horrible death. She felt responsible for Tamila’s death, too—her long-lost friend had died helping her.
Kieran and Barb kept asking Ibis questions about his long life, which he answered with grace and humor without actually divulging very much.
Cassidy was tempted to have a glass of her mom’s whiskey, but decided against it. Blotting out the unseen world hadn’t protected herself or anyone else, and had only left them vulnerable to some very real danger. Tamila, Allie, and the others might still be alive, she thought, if not for her own stubborn refusal to face reality.
One by one they dozed off, exhausted. Kieran slept in the armchair, either unwilling to be alone or deciding that he didn’t feel like sleeping in his own bed, in the room where Nibhaz had once been summoned via Ouija board.
Cassidy slept fitfully, suffering hellish dreams and feeling feverish, her insides burning. She slumped between Ibis and Barb on the couch, her head on Ibis’s shoulder, Barb’s head on her hip, and felt comforted by the presence of her friends.
“
What’s all this?” her mother asked when she arrived home. Early daylight streaked in through the glass door to the balcony.
Cassidy rose up, blinking. She smiled drowsily at her mom. The other three remained asleep.
“Morning,” Cassidy said.
“
Who’s this?” Her mom nodded at Ibis. “New boyfriend?”
Cassidy looked at his closed eyes and his beautiful face, trying to determine how she felt about him. “I don’t know what you’d call him. A friend.”
“What did you kids get into last night?”
“
We saw some of the things you didn’t want Kieran and me to know about,” Cassidy said. “I understand why you wanted to protect us from all of it. We can’t hide from reality forever, though, Mom. You grow up, and reality finds you, whether you want it to or not.”
Her mother looked upset. “What exactly happened?”
“Any chance I can tell you later? It’s been a long night. Also, you really need to keep your phone charged.”
“
Oh, this damned thing.” Her mom pulled the smartphone from her purse. “It’s so greedy for electricity. It must be charged constantly. I miss my old phone—that one wasn’t so delicate and needy.” Her mother frowned. “But everyone’s all right?”
“
Yeah. I think so.” Cassidy looked at Kieran. “Better than before, even.”
Her mother looked around the room again and sighed. “It’s nice to have both of you kids here again.”
“It’s nice to be home, Mom,” Cassidy said. Then she added, “I love you. Kieran loves you, too.”
Her mother’s eyes glimmered for a moment, and she hugged Cassidy. “I suppose you’ll all be needing breakfast.”
“I’ll take care of it. You should rest.”
When her mother went on into her room, Cassidy tried to sleep again, but couldn’t. She had too many questions left, and very few answers. She wondered where those thirteen monks had gone, and whether she’d only succeeded in making herself new, more powerful enemies.
She decided that she probably wouldn’t be able to rest again until Ibis performed the exorcism and sent the archdemon back to Hell.
Cassidy slid out from under Barb, stood, and stretched. Moving as quietly as she could manage, she crept past Kieran slumbering in the armchair and opened the squeaky balcony door. Cassidy stepped out on the balcony and lit her last cigarette, looking out at the weedy sinkhole in the early morning light. A miniature golf club just wasn’t the most effective weapon for defeating an archdemon, she thought.
After a minute, Kieran stepped outside with her, his eyes still heavy with sleep.
“
Sorry,” she whispered. “Did I wake you up?”
“
It’s cool,” he said.
“
You feeling okay?”
Kieran shrugged. “I feel like an idiot, if that’s what you mean. I can’t believe I let those cult freaks suck me in like that. I should have listened to you.”
“You’re stubborn and you don’t listen,” Cassidy said. “We’re definitely related.”
He smiled a little.
“Thanks,” he said. “Thanks for being there for me. Thanks for saving me.”
“
What else was I going to do? You’re already an evil little brother. You don’t need a demon to help you with that.”
Kieran laughed. “And you guys really summoned a demon into my room all those years ago?”
“I can promise you he’s not in there now.” Cassidy touched her stomach, where she could feel the dense, roiling heat of the captured demon. “You should get some rest.”
“
I will.” Kieran hesitated, then hugged her before stepping through the glass door into his room. Cassidy smiled to herself as he drew the curtain against the sunlight.
Cassidy returned through the door to the living room to find Ibis awake and watching her.
“Still alive?” she asked quietly, to avoid waking Barb. She sank to the couch between her two friends, old and new.
“
I slept like the dead,” Ibis said. He gestured to her stomach. “How’s the little guy?”
“
It’s like being pregnant with the Antichrist. Unholy heartburn. Any chance you can wave your magic wand and make him go away?”
“
We’ll exorcize him. Can we go to my place? I need some tools and manuscripts I have there.”
“
It’s not one of those strip-off-your-clothes-and-get-on-the-altar situations, is it?” Cassidy asked.
“
It’s not. Shouldn’t we wake your friend and bring her along?” He glanced at Barb asleep on the couch.
“
She’ll survive. Let her sleep. It won’t be the first time she’s woken up on this couch after a wild night. Now let’s go get this thing out of me.”
Ibis and Cassidy left the apartment together. Being with him gave her a comfortable feeling. Ibis had been there for her, had understood her and known just what she needed.
Cassidy was tempted to stop for a strong early-morning drink along the way—she’d certainly earned it—but again she shook off the thought. She’d poisoned her brain far too much, for far too many years. Now her mind felt clear and sharp, ready to face the day, ready to grapple with the world, both the seen and the unseen.
THE END
Thanks so much for reading my newest book! If you’re a returning fan, I thank you so much for your continued support of me and my ability to feed my family. If you’re a new reader, I hope you enjoyed this one and will consider looking at a few of my other books as well!
I am a small independent author and depend heavily on word of mouth and good reviews to help my books reach new readers. If you enjoyed
The Unseen
, I hope you will tell others about or consider leaving a review on whichever ebook retailer you like best.
The Unseen
was an unusually personal book for me to write, set in the city of Atlanta where I’ve lived most of my life, aside from my college years and some time I spent living in Los Angeles. It is full of details that are of significance to me. Cassidy’s house is based very closely on one where I nearly lived, and I’ve always wondered what my life would have been like if I’d chosen to live there. My wife did live in the area for a while, near Candler Park. Cassidy’s mother’s apartment is essentially the apartment of one of my best friends from high school, though the apartment complex itself is more like one where I later lived—full of flowers when I moved in, full of sharp, saw-toothed bushes and graffiti by the time I moved out (gang-tag graffiti, not the cool artistic kind you’d find in places like Little Five). Little Five Points is a place where I used to sneak away with friends during high school, a fantastic patch of color and creativity. Like Cassidy, I spent much of my life having terrible nightmares and coping with a dark, runaway imagination while awake. I was seeing scary monsters in my closet at a much, much later age than most people...
When I began writing this book, I expected it to be a standalone novel. By the end, I realized how much I enjoyed these particular characters, and I feel I’ve only scratched the surface of their strange world, so I now intend to write a sequel to
The Unseen
. I don’t have any final information about the title or release date, but it would be sometime in 2014.
You can keep up with my new releases by going to my website and signing up for my new release newsletter, which (as the name would imply) only goes out when I have a new book to tell readers about.
I also am very active on Twitter and Facebook and love to talk with readers! Here are my links:
Amazon Author Page
(where you can see all my books and you can sign up for Amazon to notify you automatically when I release a new one):
http://www.amazon.com/author/jlbryan
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http://www.jlbryanbooks.com/
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Finally, here are links to my other books (you can also find about more about these on my website). Thanks so much for taking the time to read
The Unseen
!
The Jenny Pox series (supernatural/horror)
Science Fiction Novels
The Songs of Magic Series (YA/Fantasy)